King's Dark Tidings discussion

EDITED to add:

Christian (Group Founder), has been nice enough to let me sort out some of the Discussions and add some other types of threads.

If anyone has suggestions for organizing this group's discussions. Or for promoting it, or for anything of that sort, do feel free to post it here!

Everyone is free to post new discussions! I might have to move some around to organize them, but right now most are going into the main General Discussion section.

Do we need to have separate threads that aren't Spoilery? I think as the series goes on and if we have more new people, we might have to separate some Non-Spoiler threads out...

Right now, most of us have read books 1 and 2 and we're discussing things while waiting for 3 to come out.

Everyone else: Beware of Spoilers for books 1 and 2! :)

April wrote: "Hello!

Can we have another Section in addiction to General for Discussions on the books?
Sections for the Series as a whole, and the individual books, with spoilers and without...

Also something ..."

Hi April, I had listened to the Audiobooks, and loved them. The reader is the same for both books, and he was great!

Thanks, Tanya. I'm looking forward to listening to them!

I'm new to good reads but I wanted to join because I have very mixed feelings on this series. If it helps I've listened to the audio books, I would reccomend them. I do think the narrator does a terrible disservice for all of the female characters. The more audio books I listen to the more I wish they would have a male and female narrator to do the respective parts. This actually leads me to my main problem with the series so far. The female characters are just empty shells who all completey fall apart in Rez's company. I can't even count how many times Fricha turned red and pouted over something said to or said by Rez. Please excuse my spelling mishaps, I've only her the books, I haven't been able to read them in book form, yet. I wonder if the narrators terrible portrayal of the female characters made it hard for me to bond with them. But undoubtedly, the romance between Rez and Fricha is completely unearned. There is nothing charming about it and it makes it hard to ship them. I don't mean to be overly critical, my brother and I both listened at the same time to the novels and we both had the same deductions about the female characters. We both wrongly concluded that the female movement would want to tear these books apart. But it seems that it does well with the female audience, I guess because of the makeup of Rez's character. Thanks for anybody's time, it is a good series so far, just some stuff is very repetitive and sometimes it feels like the book is slapping you in the face with the greatness of Rez. I also just finished a book called The Blood Song, the main character is also a sword wielding badass, but minus the looks and all the skills. But there are some similarities and a lot of depth, I think people who like these books would relate to that series as well.

If you're looking for something to read while you wait for book 3, I HIGHLY suggest you check out Son of the Black Sword by Larry Correia. This book also features a super bad-ass main character who has trouble understanding "normal" behavior and who is trying to figure out what his purpose is after everything he knows is ripped from him.

Jackie wrote: "If you're looking for something to read while you wait for book 3, I HIGHLY suggest you check out Son of the Black Sword by Larry Correia. This book also features a super bad-ass main character who..."

Thanks for the suggestion. I will check It out. :)

Yes, the women all lusting over Rez in a crazy way is a bit annoying... but for me, I suspect there's some sort of spell cast on Rez that somehow is spurring that behavior. Otherwise, yes, the women would seem pretty disgustingly simple-minded.

I'll have to wait and see if that is revealed or not!

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Blood Song... there are a number of titles like that. Are you referring to the Anthony Ryan book? If so, I've read that series, and it is pretty good. Much more gritty, though. The KDT books have a bit of humor in them... part of that is the silliness of the women all going crazy. I don't really appreciate it, but it does lighten the tone a bit, and the tone in the KDT books make them a bit more fun, I think.

Son of the Black Sword sounds interesting. I just downloaded it...

I had read, and listened to the books, and I think the narrator portrayed the female characters perfectly. I found their behaviour to be annoying. Fricha seemed to only want Rez for his looks at first, and her tantrums over her misunderstanding with Rez were childish. But also it was humorous.


I hadn't considered that it could have been the spell that is on him that is making the females so crazy over him. I had just assumed it was because of his looks, and they thought him a lord that made him so attractive to them.

I think most of it is just Rezkin really being a hunk and seeming like a lord and being super-confident but also very polite... But Frisha keep saying that she doesn't know why she's acting so crazy and that it's totally out of character for her. Some of the other women could just naturally be horrible flirts like Sheila, and the former guildmaster/lady who is used to getting by on seduction... But just that so many women are acting that way, I really hope it's something to do with the spell cast on him... maybe a weird side-effect? Or maybe a slightly different spell so that women will help him or be distracted and not see him other than as an attractive man?

It will be interesting to see if that is true, we should find out in the next book now everyone knows the truth about him.

Yeah, I was talking about the series by Anthony Ryan, certainly more gritty and it does lack the playfulness. I've only read the first novel, I saw the latter installments weren't as well received.

The spell theory could have some merit. Will be interesting to see. I would love to see him move in a different direction romantically.

Do you all think we will eventually see him get a villain that is up to the challenge? I'm hoping somewhere out there he has an equal or even someone who is better. With his name being Rezkin it's possible at least there is a Rez out there he is related to, maybe that could be his antagonist. He is a great character and his absoluteness is different than anybody else I've read, but I would love to see him get pushed.

Brent wrote: "The female characters are just empty shells who all completey fall apart in Rez's company. I can't even count how many times Fricha turned red and pouted over something said to or said by Rez."
Say Brent, good observation! I find Rez's story hilarious. So I believe the shallowness of the females ties into the humor the author is trying to impart. My take is that this is a coming of age story and one of the key characteristics of Rez is his naivety about people in general. By following the rules, he proclaims Fricha his friend. In book 2 he gets a few butterflies in his stomach in a scene with Fricha and he wonders about it -but not a lot. This, coupled with the fact that he's the new guy on the "noble scene" has me LOL over the females and their behavior. I loved that scene when the girls are fighting in the stream and Rez thinks they are being attacked and arrives to save them stark naked. It doesn't faze Rez in the least. But wow, it really fazes the girls and they both stop fighting. Nonetheless, to your credit, I think a stronger, sensible female may strengthen the story and I hope we'll see some change in Book 3. Lastly, I don't think the author is going to write in the type of females found in Blood Song. It may just be me, but I don't think the Blood Song type of female character fits unless Rez's author develops an abused female character that learns to master the blade, or one who becomes a serial killer and takes slaves.

I agree, with your assessment. I'm blanking on the name but the character that Palace was after would probably be the best hope. She seems to have layers and she even references a lot of the shallowness and she comes from a place with a higher regard for women.

Brent wrote: "Yeah, I was talking about the series by Anthony Ryan, certainly more gritty and it does lack the playfulness. I've only read the first novel, I saw the latter installments weren't as well received...."

'Blood Song' - by Anthony Ryan, Brent, I did the same thing...I choked through Valen's first story- and decided to stop at that. It just was not for me. Too slow.

Brent wrote: "I agree, with your assessment. I'm blanking on the name but the character that Palace was after would probably be the best hope. She seems to have layers and she even references a lot of the shallo..."

I agree with you. I think the girl Palace was after would be a better women for Rez. She seems more mature, can use a sword, and is very independent.

I read that entire series by Anthony Ryan. The first book was the best... second pretty good follow up, then it started to fall apart a bit. Not badly, but the ending was not quite as satisfying as I'd hoped.

Rez and Frisha-- She doesn't seem to be a good fit at all... but I think she actually IS good for Rezkin. He doesn't really need a warrior and really, no one is going to be a match for him in any skill. Frisha and the others keep Rezkin tied to humanity and basic things. He knows what he's fighting for and doesn't despise their lack of skills, and has learned to care for him when he was brought up to be as cold as ice. And Rez finds he trusts Frisha not to stab him in his sleep! That's a big thing for him. And it means on a level that he's not at all conscious of, that he's falling for her (like that strange tightness in his chest that he can't understand!).

Frisha is entirely a normal, everyday girl--but she actually IS remarkable. She set out with only her companion, naively, perhaps, but still showing courage. And she is sensible--wearing sensible things, wanting to learn to defend herself even if it's not really something she's any good at. She managed the trip to the General's well considering she was the only female and totally sheltered and out of her depth. She's inexperienced, and besotted with Rez, but she's not stupid and keeps a pretty good head on her shoulders, other than the jealousy. She seems adaptable... I can see her going from commoner to adopted aristocratic heir to queen, in a very down to earth, sensible way. She would do that better than anyone else we've seen, I think.

The girl Pallas or whatever was in love with... promising, but she has her own mind and own path. And she didn't listen to Rez and get to the ship, which caused him to be injured and Pallas to get killed protecting her. She might be a good fighter for him (if she actually would listen), but she's already caused more trouble than she's worth, to my mind!

I've started a "Character: Frisha" discussion! I think she deserves a separate discussion. We don't know much about her, but that makes for some great speculation!

I've also started a discussion for book recommendations that might appeal to KDT readers!

Is there anything else you'd like to see?

Please feel free to start discussion threads for things you might want to talk about. Or post suggestions here.

April wrote: "I've started a "Character: Frisha" discussion! I think she deserves a separate discussion. We don't know much about her, but that makes for some great speculation!

I've also started a discussion f..."

What happened to the "Character" discussion? I can't find it now. I have been referring people who message me to this group to discuss their thoughts on the characters.

Go to the general section and in the top left it'll say showing _ of 16 topics. Just click that and you can see all the topics. It sorts them by most recent post.

Here's the link to the Characters discussion--
https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...

Only the first 5 Discussion threads are shown... which is a bit annoying... I wonder if there's a setting for that...?
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I found the Setting. Now showing top 15 discussion threads...!